Back in May 2007 I did a search by chapter of the Bible to see which scriptures were being referenced the most in the blogosphere. I wanted to see if things had changed and which scriptures were moving up in frequency and which were falling down the list. I think this is important as we see the growth of biblical discussion online over time. Here is the list from 2007 and the updated 2008 list:
Most blogged New Testament Chapters (May 2007:)
1 ) John 3 (36,269)
2) John 1 (27,154)
3) Rom 8 (24,442)
4) Mtt 5 (21,710)
5) John 14 (20,961)
6) Matt 6 (17,285)
7) Acts 2 (16,953)
8 ) John 2 (14,288)
9) 1 Cor 13 (14,209) (1 Corinthians + I Corinthians)
10) John 8 (13,322)
Most blogged New Testament Chapters (November 2008:)
1) Romans 8 – 120,123 (previous rank 3, change in frequency +95,681)
2) John 3 – 115573 (1, +79,304)
3) John 14 – 93,477 (5, +72,516)
4) Matthew 5 – 89,385 (4, +67,675)
5) Matthew 6 – 84,559 (6, +67,274)
6) John 1 – 84,700 (2, +57,546)
7) James 1 – 84,091 (NA)
8 ) Philippians 4 – 73,310 (NA)
9) Romans 12 – 72,362 (NA)
10) John 15 – 67,532 (NA)
Least blogged – Hebrews 4 – 1,115 & Revelation 10 – 1,961
Books like John are adjusted for duplicate results from 1 John of the same chapter numbers. Each of these searches were done with the full name of the book followed by the chapter (e.g. “1 Corinthians 13”) in quotes. This does not add to the calculations abbreviated names with the chapter numbers. For a full count one could search through the NT again using standard abbreviations + the frequency counts above.
Changes:
- The amount of people blogging about scriptures is dramatically increasing with many of these chapters being discussed 200-500% more than last year. That is a remarkable increase in a short period of time.
- There is still so much overlap in the lists. It begs the question why these scriptures are used more often than others and what confounding factors may have an influence in the results. For instance, “James 1” is much more likely to get confused with something non-biblical than Romans 1 or 1 Corinthians 1 would be since James is a proper name that can have many more non-biblical hits in a search than “Romans 1” is likely to have. A confounding factor that would give a scripture a higher frequency would be people using a verse at the close of an email or a blog post such as signing off with John 3:16 next to their name. That increases the frequency count but does not actually reflect the verse being used in as meaningful a way as someone discussing John chapter 3.
- Paul’s influence on discussion in the blog world is increasing. 3 of 10 are from Paul in 2008 where only 2 of 10 were from Paul in 2007. I am amazed that 1 Corinthians 13 fell from the list. It is also interesting that while Paul maintained a fairly consistent frequency the actual chapters changed.
- The influence of the Gospel is still strong and yet this year’s list has one less gospel chapter than last year’s.
The next steps are to run the numbers on the OT and make an OT list as well as a list for the entire Bible. I would also like to run the numbers in SPSS to get more descriptive data and to find trends as well as more detailed averages within the books of the Bible.
4 Responses
Interesting.
I am not quite certain as to which NT scriptures would be looked upon as “The Most Blogged”. But, my personal response would be that of the book written- Matthew. Matthew presented a broader appeal to the systematic organization of Gods people; and his defining of geneology, and its structure tha it all intailed from The Early Birth of Jesus . Jesus Ministry in Galilee…His continual presence of miracales , to healing the sick and ladden; as well as Passion week, and The Resurrection. All the NT scriptures are more up-holding for a demonstration in heremenutic appreal, as well as using it in narrative form-makes it for a easier understanding. Story telling through parable processes helps enable a simpler , and more dignified understanding for those who have not seen, nor wittnessed, or understand its Biblical context . It coinsides with the presentation of the OT Laws—teaching in parables—story like form. Luke -being my second choice due to the fact again that it teaches Jesus ‘ life by example = Parables. In other words…. fine tuning the entire passage; not just a small claim on a few verses……..missing the capture of the wholeness of the narrative written….yep.
I am not quite certain as to which NT scriptures would be looked upon as “The Most Blogged”. But, my personal response would be that of the book written- Matthew. Matthew presented a broader appeal to the systematic organization of Gods people; and his defining of geneology, and its structure tha it all intailed from The Early Birth of Jesus . Jesus Ministry in Galilee…His continual presence of miracales , to healing the sick and ladden; as well as Passion week, and The Resurrection. All the NT scriptures are more up-holding for a demonstration in heremenutic appreal, as well as using it in narrative form-makes it for a easier understanding. Story telling through parable processes helps enable a simpler , and more dignified understanding for those who have not seen, nor wittnessed, or understand its Biblical context . It coinsides with the presentation of the OT Laws—teaching in parables—story like form. Luke -being my second choice due to the fact again that it teaches Jesus ‘ life by example = Parables. In other words…. fine tuning the entire passage; not just a small claim on a few verses……..missing the capture of the wholeness of the narrative written….yep.